Nvidia budget GPU specs leak, and they’re even worse than you expect

We’ve nonetheless but to see the highly-rumored GeForce RTX 4050 finances gaming GPU, however within the meantime, Nvidia is outwardly bringing out a brilliant low cost GPU that has “keep away from” written throughout it. The Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 6GB specs have simply been leaked, displaying a cut-down GPU based mostly on last-gen tech that can wrestle to play lots of the newest video games at respectable settings.

Even with its purportedly low value of $179, these specs would make the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 6GB most unlikely to be one of many best graphics card choices. When you’re looking out for an inexpensive entry-level gaming GPU, you’d be a lot better off looking for a second-hand GeForce RTX 3060 on eBay or, even higher, saving up a bit extra to get the AMD Radeon RX 7600.

Rumors concerning the GeForce RTX 3050 6GB began to flow into last year, however now extra of the specs have reportedly leaked from board companions. In line with the leaked specs, the brand new playing cards won’t solely include 2GB much less reminiscence than the usual card, however will even have simply 2,304 Ampere CUDA cores, in contrast with 2,560 on the RTX 3050 8GB. Not solely that, however the GeForce RTX 3050 6GB base and enhance clock speeds will reportedly be simply 1,042MHz and 1,470MHz respectively, in contrast with 1,552MHz and 1,777MHz on the 8GB card.

Not solely that, however reminiscence bandwidth will even be drastically decreased, because the drop in reminiscence means Nvidia is lowering the width of the reminiscence interface to only 96 bits, in contrast with 128 bits on the 8GB card. Despite the fact that each playing cards reportedly use the identical 1,750MHz (14Gbps efficient) reminiscence, the tighter bus means the RTX 3050 6GB has a complete reminiscence bandwidth of simply 168GB/s, towards 224GB/s on the 8GB model.

We will additionally infer a couple of different particulars from the leaked specs, which come from VideoCardz. If the RTX 3050 6GB solely has 2,304 CUDA cores, then which means it has 18 streaming multiprocessor models (SMs), versus the 20 on the 8GB card. This offers the 6GB card 18 RT cores for ray tracing and 72 Tensor cores, in contrast with 20 and 80 respectively on the 6GB card. This implies the RTX 3050 6GB will even have decreased energy with regards to processing options resembling ray tracing and DLSS in video games.

The decreased specs and clock pace additionally tie in with rumors that the GeForce RTX 3050 6GB complete board energy (TBP) is simply 70W, which is far decrease than the 130W of the 8GB card. It’s potential that the RTX 3050 6GB could have no further energy connectors

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 6GB specs

In line with the newest rumors and hypothesis, the GeForce RTX 3050 6GB specs record is:

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 6GB value

The very best estimate for the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 6GB value is $179, based mostly on rumor and hypothesis, as no official value has been introduced by Nvidia.

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 6GB launch date

The very best estimate for the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 6GB launch date is February 2024, based mostly on rumor and hypothesis, as no official launch date has been introduced by Nvidia.

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 6GB benchmarks

No leaked benchmarks have been launched for the GeForce RTX 3050 6GB but, nevertheless it’s going to be slower than the RTX 3050 8GB, and that’s already a poor GPU for gaming. In my very own testing, the GeForce RTX 3050 was one of many worst-performing playing cards of the final GPU technology, and I’ve shared the graphs for Murderer’s Creed Valhalla and Cyberpunk 2077 with ray tracing under to exhibit this.

With massively decreased reminiscence bandwidth and decrease clock speeds, in addition to fewer CUDA cores, RT cores, and Tensor Cores, the RTX 3050 6GB goes to be considerably slower.

Whereas I wholeheartedly welcome the prospect of a brand new gaming GPU costing below $200, the GeForce RTX 3050 6GB seems to be like one to keep away from. Hopefully, we’ll see a GeForce RTX 4050 based mostly on the Ada structure within the close to future or, even higher, see the value of present GPUs come down. Within the meantime, take a look at our full GeForce RTX 4060 review in the event you’re trying to get an Nvidia Ada GPU for the most affordable value potential.